Track day turning into a high speed car wash

cossie1600

YouTube - ‪0611 CART Lime Rock Park Time Trial 370Z Wet‬‏

Go figures, another rainy day in New England. Global warming, we are all gonna die!!! Video doesn't show how bad it was, I had a tough time seeing out the windshield

sig11

Wow. That sure was a toad strangler... you can see how heavy it is in the upper right corner of the windshield. How did you do?

ChrisSlicks

That was sure wet. Seems like the track has decent drainage at least.

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cossie1600

I finished 1st in the stock class, but was behind a couple slightly modded EVOs and E36 M3s overall. I did the time trial during the heaviest of the rain, so I screwed up on when I should line up. The M3s guys went out a little bit later, but they were faster than me after the track became wet anyway. I don't know if I suck or if the tires suck or if the car sucked. I am still trying to figure out why. I have RE11 at 6/32nd, but they were able to come off the corner so much easier than I can. When I tried to come around the corner at the same speed they were, my backend would kick out. It was quite annoying.

The ABS suck on this car too, I had such a tough time braking as the ABS engage way too easily. The XP8 is better than the XP10, but I still don't think the car likes it that much.

Lime Rock repaved their track surface two years ago, they took care of a lot of puddles and rivers, but they added some new ones at the worst place.

ChrisSlicks

You might have too much rear sway, makes it very difficult to get power down on the exit in the wet. Plus I think the RE-11's have a tendency to break away rather suddenly in the wet, you just feel grip, grip, grip, gone ...

Braking in the wet with race pads is a challenge. Need to roll into the brake a little to get the nose planted and then increase the pressure. I usually install the Mintex Xtreme pads for the wet as they are much more progressive.

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Hotchkis ARB | Stillen CAI | Art Pipes | Berk CBE | Stillen AP Racing Brakes | AE Performance Oil Cooler | BC Racing ER Coilovers | Doran Control Arms

cossie1600

my car is basically all stock except for tires and pads. the z is not a snappy car stock, so i dont think it is the sway bar.

the bmws were running the z1s, which i had on my rx8. i am with you that the re11 are more snappy and doesnt like to slide like the z1s. can the z1 be that much faster than the rain?

i had the chance to swap the pads back to stock, but i didnt feel like swapping pads in the pouring rain. lazy on my part.

after reviewing the videos, outside of the driver and maybe tires, i think the lsd on the m3 might be another one of the big difference maker as their cars just came off the corner so much better. whenever i tried to jump back on the power, my car would jump sideway while theirs would hook. in the dry i was faster than they were, mostly because i have more power. the wetter it got, the slower i became relative to the competition. of course it could have been me chickening out, but still i have to give them credit for being a great driver. my pouring lap time was 15 sec plus slower than my first dry session.

ChrisSlicks

Ah, okay thought you had aftermarket sway bars. Interesting that the car was that snappy stock, I found the car to be fairly controllable in the rain under the stock setup but yes I think the diff is the weak point. In the rain the diff locks up very easily with moderate power input, only real option is to feed into the power more smoothly.

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cossie1600

nada, got married and my mod days are over, i will try to cut some videos, you can see they gained so much on me at the exit. it definitely wasnt like that in the dry. i was actually quite frustrated in the car because there was nothing i can do. if i try to go any faster, i would have lost control. by no means am i saying i was driving as fast as the car could go, i meant as fast as i would dare to go given the consequences.

ChrisSlicks

I think you were trying to drive the car like you did in the dry session with early power down on exit which just wasn't working. Getting the power down on the exit of a corner in the wet is a bit like threading a needle, it can't be rushed and you have to be extremely precise. If you're sliding your not accelerating. It also helps to modify your line slightly, turn in later, and unwind the wheel more before accelerating.

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Hotchkis ARB | Stillen CAI | Art Pipes | Berk CBE | Stillen AP Racing Brakes | AE Performance Oil Cooler | BC Racing ER Coilovers | Doran Control Arms

cossie1600

agree with you on altering my line, i hugged the apexes too close

I did some numbers crunching. My best lap of the day was the first lap of the first session, basically due to having no traffic and in the dry. In the rain, my times range from 11-16 seconds slower. Top speed was lowered from 124 to 112mph.

Since my tires are 50mm wider than the BMWs, I wonder if that hurt me. I need to open the videos